


Parthenogenesis

by Mr_Pinniped



Series: Ducktales Pre-Canon Events [5]
Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Condescending doctor, Della really shouldn't have touched that cursed statue, Family, Family Bonding, Gen, McDuck Clan - Freeform, Medical Procedures, Offscreen egg-laying, Pregnancy, Protective Siblings, Sibling Love, Unplanned Pregnancy, Weird Biology, Where did HDL come from?, in this household we appreciate Dad Donald, non-traditional family, some of the science is accurate but some liberties were taken
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:27:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26189464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mr_Pinniped/pseuds/Mr_Pinniped
Summary: Della starts to feel sick after she, Donald, and Scrooge find a large statue of a Komodo dragon.  Beakley and Gyro attempt to diagnose the problem.
Relationships: Della Duck & Donald Duck
Series: Ducktales Pre-Canon Events [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2028373
Comments: 18
Kudos: 81





	1. Chapter 1

The Cloudslayer lurched in midair, slamming Donald backwards into his seat. He looked at his sister Della, whose face was looking considerably paler than usual. She was squeezing the steering column in front of her with a much firmer grip than seemed necessary. 

Scrooge’s voice drifted up from the cargo hold, “Everything all right up there, Della?”

“It’s fine. Just… a little turbulence is all,” her voice sounded tense. Donald stared at her- he could have sworn he had seen Della start to tremble moments _before_ the plane lurched.

“Are you sure you’re ok, sis?” he asked.

She gritted her teeth and kept her gaze firmly out the front window. “I’m fine. It’s just, um, lady problems.”

“Ah.” Donald sat back in his seat, feeling a bit awkward. “Hey, would you like me to see if we’ve got a hot water bottle somewhere? Or…” he thought for a moment. “Wait a minute. You don’t normally have an egg cycle in the springtime, do you?” 

Della glanced at him, surprised. “How would  _ you  _ know when my cycles are?” 

Donald snickered. “We’re twins, Della. You really think that after all these years, I haven’t noticed there are always certain times of the year that you’re particularly insistent I stay out of your room?”

Della gave him a weak smile, then focused on the plane’s instruments. “Yeah, I guess my schedule’s a little off. It happens sometimes…  _ ah!”  _ she squeezed her eyes closed and tightened her grip on the steering column again. The plane faltered, but she quickly steadied it. “Just a cramp.” 

“I could go find you some painkillers?” Donald offered.

“I’ll be all right. It’s less than twenty minutes until we land.”

The landing was one of the roughest Donald had ever experienced. They could hear Scrooge swearing from his seat in the cargo hold, and when the plane finally rolled to a halt in the hangar outside the Money Bin, he appeared on the flight deck, looking extremely cross. 

“How did we have that much turbulence, Della? The weather was completely clear all the way from-” He paused, taking note of Della’s pale face and clenched jaw. “Are you all right, lass?”

“Just a cramp,” Della repeated, rising from her seat. She gasped and swayed on the spot, grabbing onto her uncle’s elbow for support. Donald rushed in and took her other arm and they steered her through the plane’s hatch and down the stairs. There were two other people in the hangar- Bentina Beakley and Gyro Gearloose. Gyro’s hair was slightly burned and his clothes were covered in grease, while Mrs. Beakley looked annoyed. They were standing next to Beakley’s car, and appeared to be arguing. The McDuck family began to hear them as they approached, Della still walking unsteadily, clinging to her uncle and brother for support.

“I only wanted an oil change, Gyro! Not any ‘fancy upgrades!’” 

“You’ll like them as soon as I show you how to work them all, look at the-”

Gyro was interrupted by a retching sound, as Della broke free of Scrooge and Donald so she could vomit into a nearby trashcan. Mrs. Beakley was at her side in an instant, pushing her hair out of her face, and pulling a tissue out of her purse. Della took it gratefully and wiped her mouth. 

“Airsickness? Bad food somewhere?” Mrs. Beakley asked. The first seemed unlikely. Della had been a pilot for years and never had trouble with motion sickness before. 

Della shook her head, still leaning against the trash can. “No. It feels like, well,” she looked up at Mrs. Beakley, “It feels almost like an egg-cycle. But the timing is wrong, and it’s never been this painful.” 

“Sit down.” Mrs. Beakley guided Della over to a bench by the wall. “And go get her some water!” she barked over her shoulder at Donald, who scurried off.

Mrs. Beakley knelt down and took one of Della’s hands in hers. She spoke quietly, so that none of the men would overhear. “Della, I know this is an awkward question, but is there any chance you might have  _ fertilized  _ eggs?”

Della laughed, despite the pain. “I’m a lesbian, Mrs. B. So no.”

“It’s not actually impossible. There’s been some new research into gene transfusions. And-” 

“Not helpful, Gyro.” Mrs. Beakley glared over her shoulder at him, and he sheepishly took a step back, but he continued to hover nearby like a curious oversized insect. Della was too tired to care. 

“May I?” Mrs. Beakley placed her hand over Della’s abdomen and Della nodded. She clenched her teeth and breathed deeply. The pressure didn’t  _ hurt, _ but it was oddly uncomfortable. 

“You do feel a bit swollen. But nothing too out of the ordinary, that I can tell. Could it have been something you ate or drank while you were traveling?”

“We all ate the same things- if it were food poisoning, Scrooge or Donald would be sick too, wouldn’t they?” 

“Probably.”

Donald returned with a bottle of water. He opened it and handed it to Della, who sipped it gratefully. Mrs. Beakley looked back at him and Gyro. “Why don’t you two go make yourselves useful by unloading the cargo? And bring a first-aid kit over here while you’re at it.”

The two young men glanced at each other, nodded awkwardly, and began walking back towards the Cloudslayer. 

“Do you know what’s wrong with her?” Donald asked, glancing back at his sister. 

“Why would I know? I’m not  _ that  _ kind of doctor,” Gyro began. “But Mrs. Beakley suspects that she might be pregnant.”

A flush of red appeared at Donald’s ears and quickly spread over his entire face. “WHAT?” Gyro jumped out of range of Donald’s fists, as Donald began squawking loudly and incomprehisbly. Gyro could only understand a few snatches of words-

“My sister…”

“Who would…”

“Wait a minute.” Donald stood upright again, the bright flush leaving his face as suddenly as it appeared. “Della’s a lesbian. How would she get pregnant?”

“Well, there has been some new research into gene transfusion that uses the nucleus from a donor ovum and…” Gyro paused. “It's difficult and expensive, though. Can't have happened by accident. I suppose there’s always the possibility of parthenogenesis, but there’s never been a documented case in a duck.”

“Partho-what?” Donald opened the hatch of the Cloudslayer and began unloading crates of cargo from their last adventure. 

“Parthenogenesis. Reproduction from an unfertilized ovum. A single female organism may reproduce via recombination of chromosomes and the spontaneous conversion of a haploid gamete to a diploid zygote.” 

“I only understood about half of those words.” Donald admitted, moving another crate to reveal the tail of a giant golden statue, that had been the main artifact they were searching for. 

Gyro paused and tapped his fingers against his leg as he attempted to re-word his sentence. “Fatherless offspring, but not direct clones of the mother. It’s unusual in vertebrates. Never in mammals, but occasionally happens to avians. More common in certain lizards, such as geckos and… Komodo… dragons…?” Gyro stammered and his eyes widened as Donald shifted the last box and pulled out the large golden statue. It looked just like a Komodo dragon, nearly six feet long, with glittering emerald eyes.

“Donald? Where did you say you were just travelling?” 

“The Temple of the Monitor Lizard King. On the southernmost island in Indonesia.”

“Monitor lizards? Um, I’m not an expert on magic, but… Is there any chance that statue was cursed?” Gyro asked, stepping away from the plane, nervously pushing his glasses up the bridge of his bill.

“Scrooge thought there might be, but that it just as likely had dissipated years ago. Several other adventurers had attempted to recover it. Though,” Donald paused. “The eyes were glowing before. I think they went out when Della picked it up, but then nothing happened until just now. It's been a few days…”

Donald trailed off. He looked from Gyro, to the statue, to Della, and back to Gyro. 

“Ah, phooey.” 


	2. Chapter 2

It had been a difficult week. Della was frequently nauseous, and her abdomen was visibly swelling now. It had become clear that whatever was happening was not the standard cycling of unfertilized eggs that occurred in most female ducks a few times per year. Gyro had found some old blood-testing equipment in the lab, and, after pricking Della’s finger with a lancet, confirmed that her hormone levels were consistent with pregnancy, though Della continued to insist that fertilization was impossible. 

This morning, though, she had woken up with cramps so intense she could hardly walk to the door and call Mrs. Beakley up to her room. It had become clear that the eggs were ready to be laid, and the family physician, Dr. Elinor Caduckeus, had been called. The three women were still upstairs, while Scrooge and Donald sat in tense silence on opposite sides of the dining room table. Though the physician had assured them Della’s health would improve once the eggs had been laid, and the chicks, if there were in fact chicks, were no longer draining their mother’s physical resources, both men were still too anxious to speak. Scrooge was staring at some old magical scrolls, glazed eyes running through the same block of text over and over again. Donald stared blankly at the wall, tapping his foot with rhythmic impatience against the floor. The kitchen door opened, and Duckworth came in, carrying a tea-tray set for four. Gyro was behind him, wheeling a contraption that looked like a large, metallic pillow with a glowing hole in the center. Atop it was perched a thick biology textbook. 

“She’s laying?” Gyro asked, setting the book on the table and taking a seat.

Scrooge nodded, taking his tea from Duckworth and stirring in one lump of sugar. “Aye. Mrs. Beakley and Dr. Caduckeus are upstairs with her right now. And then we can find out for sure if the eggs are fertile.” 

“Based on her hormone levels from the blood test, I suspect they are,” said Gyro.

“And Mrs. B. agrees,” added Donald. “She said nausea and headaches are very common symptoms. But it just seems so unlikely, if there isn’t a father.”

“I cannae find anything definitive about a pregnancy-related curse in the Temple of the Monitor Lizard King, though,” said Scrooge, indicating the pile of scrolls in front of him. “So often, when a young lass suddenly finds herself in a family way, she just isn’t honest about the circumstances. I want to believe her, but I’m just not sure there’s sufficient evidence for your theory, Gyro. .”

Gyro opened the textbook to a page marked with a post-it. “I’ve been continuing to research the issue. Spontaneous avian parthenogenesis has never been scientifically documented, though it has occasionally been induced through experimental hormone treatments: twice in a turkey, and once in a finch. Though as I said earlier, it’s more common in reptiles- including Komodo dragons.”

Scrooge peered over Gyro’s shoulder, then held up the scroll he had been studying. “Perhaps you’re right, lad. This glyph means ‘dragon’, I’m sure of it, but this glyph here,” he pointed to a spiky shape on the page, “Sometimes is translated as ‘baby’, but in other contexts it means ‘teapot’. And it’s an unusual dialect- I cannae be entirely sure which is meant here.” 

Gyro glanced up at the scroll and shrugged, returning to his biology book. “The embryos formed in the process of parthenogenesis are not always viable, so even if the eggs appear fertile, we won’t know right away if they’ll develop into healthy hatchlings. Though if they do, it’s guaranteed that the offspring will be males.”

“Why’s that?” asked Donald.

“It’s in the chromosomes,” Gyro said, rising from his seat and waving the book in front of Donald’s face. Scrooge and Donald gave each other a sidelong glance, but did not interrupt him. “Della, as a female bird, has ZW chromosomes. If my hypothesis is correct, and she is following the process that Komodo dragons and other lizards do, then genetically, she is both mother and father to the offspring. They won’t be exact clones of her, however, as the genes will recombine during meiosis. Because of this, none of the embryos can possibly have ZW. They’ll be ZZ, which are males, or WW, which would be non-viable.”

Scrooge stared at Gyro’s diagrams for a moment, considering their implications. “If, as you say, Della is genetically both mother and father to these eggs…” he looked questioningly at Gyro.

“It could easily be proven with DNA testing. A milliliter of amniotic fluid from one egg would be sufficient to--”

The door to the dining room opened, and Della entered. Her walk was unsteady, but her eyes were bright and she smiled broadly at the three men at the table. Dr. Caduckeus, a petite middle-aged woman wearing pointed spectacles and a bright pink lab coat, helped her into a seat, then turned to hold the door for back Mrs. Beakley, who was carrying a large box, lined with blankets. In it were four smooth eggs, nestled together.

“Bless me beaks,” said Scrooge, looking over the eggs. “Do you know yet if they’re…”

Dr. Caduckeus smiled. “Della requested that you all find out as a family.” She looked at Donald and Gyro. “Is one of you the father?”

“Oh, no!” Scrooge chuckled gently as identical looks of surprise and disgust crossed both of the younger men’s faces. 

“I told you, there isn’t one!” Della glared up at the doctor, who gave the family an overly sweet smile and shook her head in disbelief.

“Donald is my nephew and Della’s twin brother," Scrooge continued, "And Gyro here is a family friend, as well as a researcher who works for my company. I called him in when you mentioned that your technician would be unable to attend the house-call. He has a knack for working with nearly any machinery, I’m sure he has already figured out how to use the… the device you brought in.”

“The Ultrawave Scanner.” Gyro stood up and wheeled the metallic device to the center of the room, and Dr. Caduckeus looked him up and down appraisingly. She bit her lip and hesitated, but finally stated, “It will help to have a steady hand on the scanner, yes. Lock the wheels and power it up. The room will need to be darkened as well.”

Gyro obeyed, and Duckworth closed the drapes. The brightest light in the room now was now coming from the hole in the center of the ultrawave scanner. Dr. Caduckeus lifted one of the eggs from the box and set it on top of the device.

“Do you know how to increase the brightness?” she looked down her bill at Gyro. He turned a knob, and the light from the scanner intensified. The yolk was clearly visible now. There was a slightly dark ring around it, but it looked mainly featureless. “Unviable. It's not clear at this stage if this egg was initially fertilized or not, but there are no signs of development.” Dr. Caduckeus said flatly, lifting the egg from the machine and setting it back in the box, marking the shell with a yellow crayon. “It may be for the best, not to have so many on your first clutch.”

“As if I could control it,” muttered Della under her breath. Only Donald heard her, and placed a steadying hand on her shoulder. She reached up and squeezed his wrist as Dr. Caduckeus placed the second egg on the scanner. This time, there was a much darker shape in the middle, with a clear network of veins surrounding it. 

Dr Caduckeus broke into a smile. “Well, congratulations, little lady. You’re going to be a mother after all.” Della gasped and squeezed Donald’s hand harder. He winced, but made no sound. 

“Young man, do you see how to print a 3-D scan?” she glanced down at Gyro, who was kneeling on the floor in front of the machine’s control panel.

“The button that says ‘3-D scan’ and then the button that say ‘print results.’”

“Such a clever lad.” Dr. Caduckeus’ voice was irritatingly sweet now, but Gyro stared fixedly at the screen and fiddled with the settings. When the scan was complete, Dr. Caduckeus removed the fertile egg, marking it in red, and returned it to the box.

The next two eggs (which Dr. Caduckeus marked in blue and green, respectively), also proved to be fertile and were developing normally- the little dark form in the blue egg even moved a little bit in response to the scanner’s light. Dr. Caduckeus handed the scanned printouts to Della and gave a list of instructions for incubation while Gyro powered down the machine. 

Scrooge stood up from the table. “Well, thank you very much, doctor. If you’ll follow me to my office, we can settle the bill. Gyro, why don’t you take the scanner out to her van?”

Dr. Caduckeus rose to follow him. “Make sure you eat plenty of protein and calcium over the next few days, Miss Della.”

“Are you hungry now? I can whip something up for you.” Della nodded, and Mrs. Beakley disappeared into the kitchen with Duckworth.

“And you really ought to inform the father. It won’t be easy to raise three little ducklings all on your own.” Dr. Caduckeus gave that simpering smile again, then followed Scrooge out the door, leaving Della, Donald, and the eggs alone in the dining room.

“Condescending bitch.” muttered Della as the door closed behind the doctor. “I could have  _ strangled  _ her upstairs, if Mrs. B hadn’t been holding my hand the whole time. Look, I know physicians sometimes have to ask invasive and personal questions, but there is a  _ line!”  _ Della slammed her fist on the table and Donald reached out instinctively to steady the box of eggs.

“Glad to see you’re feeling better at least.” Donald’s face broke into a grin for what felt like the first time all week. The twins looked at each other for a few moments, then burst into peals of laughter as all of the stress from the week faded away. 

After a few minutes of quiet, Della ran a hand gently over the eggs. “Three little ducklings. I’ll be a mom in a few months.” 

“You know, Della, I was thinking. I could be the dad. If you want?”

Della quirked an eyebrow at him. “We  _ definitely  _ didn’t…”

“No, no, I know it was the curse. And technically, yeah, I’m their uncle. But Uncle Scrooge is very nearly a second father to us. Why shouldn’t I be the same to my nephews? You don’t have to raise three little boys alone.”

“How do you know they’ll be boys?”

“That’s what Gyro said. Something about chromosomes. You can ask him later.”

“What are you asking me?” Gyro appeared again in the doorway. 

“Later,  _ clever lad _ ” smirked Della.

Gyro rolled his eyes.  “I was actually looking for Mr. McDuck, is he upstairs?”

“Gyro, wait,” said Donald, and Gyro, who was turning to go, halted and spun back around, frizzy hair flopping into his eyes as he did so. “You said you could do some sort of genetic testing? To prove it was the Komodo Dragon Pathogensys Curse, or whatever you called it?” 

“Yes!” Gyro said brightly, “Professor von Drake just sent some old gene-sequencing equipment to the lab here! I’ve been hoping to use it on something other than my own blood. Good to know that the sequencer works, of course, but I didn’t need to spend four hours finding out that I am, in fact, a chicken.”

Della giggled. “Would it harm the eggs in any way? If there’s any risk?

“I could test the infertile one, if you’d like. The amniotic fluid should still yield results, and no harm done, as there isn’t a chick.” 

“Oh! And that would determine the paternity question?”

“Almost certainly.”

“Then by all means,” Della passed the yellow-marked egg to Gyro, who tucked it carefully under his arm. He departed, leaving the twins alone again.

Donald lifted the green-marked egg into his lap, and Della took the box with the other two, wrapping them in the blanket close to her body. 

“Is it too early to start thinking of names for them?” Della asked, as Donald draped his jacket over the egg he was holding. 

“I like old-fashioned, distinguished names,” said Donald. “Like Llewellyn.”

“Yuck! Why would you saddle a baby with a name like Llewellyn?”

“Well, what do you suggest, then?”

“Something exciting! Like Turbo!”

“Turbo’s not a  _ real  _ name!” 

“He moved! The blue one- I’m sure he just moved! He  _ wants _ to be called Turbo!”

They looked at each other and laughed again for several minutes. “I guess we’ll just have to figure this out as we go, right Don?”

“Guess so, Dumbella,” Donald smirked at his sister, then sat upright. “Oh! I found a proper pram for them, with a heating pad. It’s up in the attic. There might be other baby stuff around the manor. I don’t know how much Scrooge will be willing to spend on his grandnephews.”

“I’ll find a way to persuade him. We’re a family, and we’ll be raising these kids together.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had initially intended the first chapter to be a one-shot, but several comments encouraged me to continue developing this headcanon, so here we are. There will be one more chapter after this, where the triplets learn the truth about their birth.


	3. Chapter 3

“I’m not going to ask her. She’ll tell us when she’s ready.” Huey looked down from his bunk at his brothers, who were seated on the floor with Webby. She had brought another bulletin board into the triplets room, covered with pictures of Donald, Della, and themselves, all linked to an index card with a giant question mark on it.

“Aren’t you even a little bit curious?” Louie asked.

“We’re teenagers now! We can handle knowing who our father is, and what happened to him!” whined Dewey. “I don’t get why this needs to be a mystery anymore!”

“My money’s still on Randy Empire,” said Louie.

“There is no evidence whatsoever that Mom and Randy Empire ever even  _ met, _ let alone--”

“That’s the thing, though! There’s no evidence for anyone to have been your father! I can’t find anything about a romantic relationship in Della’s past, except for one formal ball she attended with Selene! And that was five years before you were born! It doesn’t add up!” groaned Webby, putting more pushpins into the board and getting bits of yarn tangled in her hair. 

“That’s what I’m worried about” said Huey. “Do you think she hasn’t told us because…” he looked around and gulped nervously, his voice dropping to a whisper. “Do you think maybe it wasn’t  _ consensual? _ ” 

His siblings looked at him, horrified. Louie finally broke the silence. “I hate to say it, Huey, but,” he shuddered, “You might be right.”

“Poor Della!” Webby gasped.

“Well, if that’s true, then it’s all the more reason to find out who knocked her up!” Dewey’s voice grew louder and angrier with each word. “So that we can bring him to justice and make sure he doesn’t hurt anyone else!” 

“It’s been thirteen years, Dew. He probably already has. Some men are just terrible like that.”

“If  _ that  _ happened, though, we might have more siblings!” Huey sat bolt upright on his bed, and scrambled down the ladder to where the others were gathered, looking over Webby’s board. .

“And if we do, we should know about them before we start high school.”

“Why?”

“That’s when people start dating.” Dewey shrugged. “I don’t want to accidentally kiss my own half-sister without knowing it!”

“I still don’t want to ask Mom directly,” said Huey. “Maybe we can ask Dr. Gearloose if he can give us a DNA test or something”

“What don’t you want to ask me?” Della’s voice came through the slightly-open doorway. All four of them jumped, and then looked at each other nervously. 

“How long were you standing there?” Huey asked.

“Couple minutes,” said Della. “Can I come in?”

She pushed the door open and sat down on the floor in front of the kids.  _ Teenagers now, _ she reminded herself, regarding the faces in front of her. Dewey’s face was still flushed with rage, Huey was fidgeting nervously, Webby had her knees pulled up to her chest and was staring at Della with wide eyes, while Louie was avoiding her gaze. 

Della sighed. “You want to know who your dad is?” They nodded.

“Well, in all of the ways that matter, it’s Donald.”

“Seriously?”

“That’s gross!”

“You don’t  _ actually  _ mean-” 

“No, he’s not your biological father,” Della laughed a bit at the disgusted looks on her son’s faces. “You three don’t  _ have  _ a biological father. Just me.”

“How would that work? If we’re your clones, shouldn’t we look identical to you?” Huey’s face was curious.

“No, there was still some genetic recombination. I’d need to take a look at a biology textbook to remember exactly how it works but basically my DNA rearranged itself and fertilized my own eggs.”

“Why, though?” Webby asked.

“A word of advice kids- don’t touch cursed idols until you’re absolutely sure the curse has been deactivated.” Della chuckled. “I don’t regret it though. If it hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t have you three amazing young men now.”

“Come to think of it,” Della mumbled, “The idol is probably still in the garage somewhere. Or maybe the Money Bin. If you still want to bring the one who knocked me up to justice.” She winked at Dewey.

He thought about it for a moment, looking at his two brothers, who gave the slightest of nods. 

“No, that’s ok. You’re right. In all the ways that matter, Uncle Donald is our dad.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's a wrap for this story! Hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
